Developing an adequate narrative that contextualizes the science in a responsible way is precisely what a serious Christian theology should do. & such a narrative does not have to be created from scratch because the necessary components already exist within the Christian tradition.

There's something I'd like to draw attention to here: The fact that Margulis (and seemingly neo-darwinists) place quite a lot of emphasis on and stock in something that seems very "extra-scientific". Namely, narratives. Nature as being competition-centric, "red in tooth and claw" versus nature as cooperative, achieving symbiotic relationships, etc. I suppose we could add in other views, like Michael Denton's perspective on nature as arranged such that the introduction and development of life (and eventually, intelligent life) as being inevitable. Or Simon Conway Morris' views that nature is rather tightly constrained, inevitably leading to certain forms (and again, inevitably, intelligent life). I'm sure there are others.

Now, I'd argue that all of these views - from Margulis' and the Neo-Darwinists' to Conway Morris' and Denton's - are ultimately not pure science. And I also recognize that TEs don't have a unified view on such things. However, I do think this sort of thing is incredibly important for TEs (and ID proponents) to not only think about, but to write about, even cooperate on. And I also think that the reaction to Margulis and Lovelock should be taken note of. If I'm right that these "narratives" are ultimately extra-scientific, yet still treated as topics of professional interest by scientists, then I think this illustrates a problem that TEs are going to eventually have to face (and are being faced now by men like Conway Morris, etc.) Namely, the bulk of the controversy with religion and evolution does not have to do with the science itself, and that accepting the science yet rejecting the narrative (or worse, proposing an alternative narrative - say, one that emphasizes teleology and otherwise) is inevitably going to lead to a conflict that will at once be both inside and outside "science".

Or, put another way: For TEs, just as with ID proponents, it's not going to be enough to accept the science and the data. Rejecting that extra-scientific narrative means that the spot that (rightly or wrongly) Behe and Dembski occupy today, will be occupied tomorrow by Ken Miller, Conway Morris, and others (and, at least with the more rabid wing - whose influence even I think is on the wane - 'tomorrow' is 'today'.)

Dave,
Lynn Margulis has done a lot of railing against neo-Darwinism over the years. She really is a maverick--and a rather refreshing one, in a way. (She was the first wife of Carl Sagan) She came up with the endosymbiotic theory which emphasized the cooperative element in prokaryotic evolution. That is, different prokaryotic strains merged. Strongly rejected at first, it's become more accepted now, I think. In a broader sense, she emphasizes cooperation among various species, and consequent gene sharing, instead of competition. She loves to tweak neo-darwinists for their emphasis on competition.
She's pretty feisty in her manner. I think she was somehow involved with Lovelock in developing the Gaia hypothesis.
When she calls a "mechanism" of evolution as being bogus, it's pretty clear she's trying to get more acceptance of her own ideas of the importance of cooperation relative to competition. As usual, both sides have probably exaggerated the relative importance of their own ideas and there's an element of truth on both sides.